Lake chain needs special help

The Daily Commercial - October 4, 2001
By BILL KOCH
Daily Commercial Correspondent


TAVARES
University of Florida scientists told the Harris Chain of Lakes Restoration Council Thursday that conventional efforts to clean up area lakes may be a waste of time.

Environmental experts told members at the third monthly meeting of the newly formed council that marshways on Lake Apopka may not accomplish the task of making the shallow lake suitable for larger fish populations.

"It looks like the flowway is not going to do much good," said Randy Bachmann, a University of Florida professor.

The advice of Bachmann and university professor Dan Canfield is to return the lake to its condition prior to 1947 when sendiments hadn't caused algae overgrowth.

Area lakes have grown murky and been choked by excess vegetation and fluid mud during the latter half of the 20th century from high nutrient drainage from farms and homes.

Lake County's state Legislative Delegation formed the advisory council last August to gather information and make recommendations to the state and the St. Johns River Water management District.

"We have some of the most impaired bodies of water in the state of Florida," said Skip Goerner, the council's chairman. "Our whole ecological system is effected as well as our economies. We're not realizing our potential."

The council must report findings to the state Legislature Nov. 25.

"We need to come up with projects or endorse projects," Goerner said. "This will get everybody on the same page." St. Johns officials have suggested establishing marshes to act as filters to remove sediments and nutrients especially in Lake Apopka, which is the county's northern most lake and channels water flow into Lake Griffin, Lake Harris, Lake Dora and other lakes in the county.

"Basically we got a nutrient problem in this basin," said Mary Paulic, who cooridinates the Ocklawaha River Basin for the state Department of Environmental Protection. Paulic outlined for the council recent efforts to measure nutrient levels in area lakes.

Bachmann said current environmental models authorities are considering for clean up efforts apply only to deepwater lakes, not to Central Florida's shallow water bodies. The deepest areas of Lake Apopka are nearly six feet.

Bachmann and Canfield also said conventional thought on the clean up may also be incorrect.

Bachmann said studies of other Florida lakes in the last 20 years showed little correlation between rising nutrients levels and increased murkiness in lakes, a popular assumption advanced by many environmentalists.

"Your job is to find our where the compromise is," Canfield said.

Goerner said the council needs to consider all information before developing recommendations.

"I think we need to look at where we agree and take that out of the equation," he said.